Help Me! BF weaning and sleep....

[teenspirit]

I have a 22 week old and a three year old and need to start some kind of workable routine and get more sleep.
I am bf and plan to until dd self weans like my son did and have just started her on solids (at present baby rice and fruit puree twice a day).
Basically my baby is not interested really in bf during the day I have to offer and generally she will take one good feed mid morning and perhaps a quick drink mid afternoon by 6pm she is desperate for bed but still only goes a max 3 hourly although mostly less and feeds throughout the night usually 2 hrly.
My son is in pre school so we need to leave the house at 8.45 am and don't get back till 9.45 and then I leave to collect him at 11.30am and get back for 12.30. I need to plan my day please help.
I want to encourage a pattern that will encourage longer sleep at night as I can't go on at this rate. My son was bf never slept well and after introduction of solids this got even worse by 10 months he was waking every 45min to 1 1/2 hrs so I'm trying to avoid the same pattern.

hello, what is she sleeping during the day? IMO she really shouldn't need 2 hrly feeds overnight and I honestly don't know how you cope with that amount of broken sleep! I know I couldn't of done that and I didn't have an older child to worry about!

Ok I would start the day with a bf at 7am ish and baby cereal breakfast, I would hope your baby would have a sleep when you take your son to nursery in the buggy or car.

Offer bf at 11ish and once you have collected your son do some sort of baby lunch,
the put your baby down for a sleep.

offer another bf when baby has woken up from sleep and then baby tea at 5ish

aim for bed at 7pm with another bf just before.

I would wake your dd up at 10pm and offer a feed and then I would not feed her again until the morning, just offer water in a beaker.

This will be hard for the first couple of nights but IMO well worth it!

I also know there will be some mums on here that really won't agree with me but that is what I did and my dd has always (touch wood) slept well and goes 7 - 7.30 to this day (she is now nearly 3)

Good luck and hope that helps Xx

I like everything girliefriend has said - that's pretty much what I do with mine (dd is 2.5, ds is 7 months).

Good luck!

similar here. dd is 6 motnhs. bf at about 7.30 when she wakes up. Breakfast at 8ish. take ds to nursery dd naps in the car 15 mins. She wants another feed at about 10am and sleeps 10.30 til 11.30ish. Lunch at about 12, go to collect ds at 12.45, dd has quick nap in the car. another bf at 1.30ish. she has a sleep for about an hour at about 2.30-3 and then another feed when she wakes up 4ish. tea at 5 with ds and last feed of the day at 7pm. asleep straight away and no feed offered if she wakes up during hte night. Ds was similar. I think 5 feeds at this sort of age is plenty in a 24hour period.

I definitely second (or third) girliefriend. It's maybe not surprising your DD isn't interested in feeding during the day as she's taking so much at night. I think you need to drastically cut back the night feeds. It will be pretty hard initially, but if you stick to it, give a feed at say 10pm ish and then set yourself an arbitary limit of say 6am before which you will not feed, but only offer water. The first couple of nights will be hard, you'll be awake and giving lots of cuddles, but I think she'll pick it up pretty quickly - also even after just one night of this she should be hungry enough to feed regularly during the day. I BF both my DDs by the way and definitely found the trick to getting them to sleep through was lots of feeding during the day.

Your drop off pick up times are just like mine were, I think my basic routine was:

7am BF

8.45 / 9am nap (in buggy if taking DD1 to nursery or in cot if DH dropped her)

11am BF

12.15 (when back from picking up DD1) babyrice / puree

12.30 nap

2.30pm BF

5pm BF followed by baby rice / puree

After bath (6.30 / 7 ish) BF again then bed.

No feed in the night.

I agree with the above but I don't think you should go cold turkey on the night feed just yet. Dream feed at around 10.30/11pm. Don't feed again until around 2.30/3am and then again at 7am. Once you are in a better routine, then you can start to think about dropping the middle of the night feed.

Definitely do a dreamfeed though, especially if you are solely bf and your baby is not fully weaned onto 3 meals per day.

If you do decide to go down this path, you need to decide on a method to help you. A good routine for feeding and sleeping during the day will go towards it, but if you have always bf to sleep and your baby has wakes so many times at night, you will need a strategy to use when dd does wake in the night and is not due a feed.

The baby whisperer pupd method is a gentler one.

You do need to be committed to doing this, otherwise it will not work.